Frankie Chavez's music is a fusion of several musical genres inspired by the versatility of different guitars with a strong blues component. Heart & Spine is his latest and most dazzling electric album than the previous ones, which he defines as hypnotic rock.
Your last work is "heart & Spine" you define it as a hypnotic blues rock. What is this?
Frankie Chavez: I do not know very well, but I read it somewhere and this record is more electric than other works that were more acoustic and I wanted to give more emphasis on this record on the electric guitars with a blues that is not pure, as we heard, for example, Tab Benoit, I consider that falls into this category. We also have an older blues like Robert Johnson and Skip James and I drink a lot to this genre, but mix it with various things, with rock, folk and much instrumental music. After this step for the electric guitar, with this more hypnotic style, with much repetition of notes and in the case of instruments, we have also the Portuguese guitar. It is a fusion of genres, hence the theme that is more hypnotic, the first single, which is the "fight", which has a very repetitive loop. I think that's where that term came out, there is a word only for the music I make, is a combination of genres passing through the blues, folk, rock, Celtic sounds and the Portuguese guitar.
Also you said that this album had a difficult birth and was the result of two years of touring and been with your family. You think it's a more mature album that you recorded for all this?
FC: Yes, absolutely. It is more mature in two directions, like you said I had two years of intensive road to play with drummer João Correia and the songs were written over time and mature live. We started that way to some of the themes and therefore the melodies grew for this more rock sound. On the other hand, since the last album that came out in 2011 and in 2014 this work was a bigger and had better preparation before going to the studio. In "family tree" at the time was playing alone, I went to the studio and had well thought out ideas, but without a great pre-production on the one hand, this is good, but then there were songs that deserve more attention. This album made a more careful preproduction, had already recorded the songs almost all at home before going to the studio, I worked and shared my ideas with João and vice versa. There have been more careful, but left room for the chance to work. I like the sudden in the studio, anyway, everything was pre-defined and more mature. Third, all was prepared with João Correia, I recorded everything with him and the base was always guitar and drums. We have a lot of chemistry when we play and it was won in the two years on the road and we did it together. The melodies sounded more cohesive after recording, so I think this album evolved from a more careful and maturety.
In your music you use various types of guitars, including the Portuguese guitar, it happens by your will to try?
FC: Yes. I really like the sound of the Portuguese guitar and as I mentioned like folk, rock and blues. I try to do a mix record a bit without ever escaping from these three genres, but as I was saying my early works were more acoustic guitars and let the sound breathes enough. In recent albums wanted to try more sounds and I think I felt more soul with this more electric sound that is so present in some things that keep hearing as Jimmy Hendrix and AC / DC are musicians I hear since I was a kid. Now, I have this project where it all began in a more acoustic way, wanted this record to make room to electric guitars and lead to a more electrifying sound.
It also in English, since you mention the Anglo-Saxon influences.
FC: Yes, always heard more Anglo-Saxon music than in Portuguese and maybe in the construction of own metric of the songs always felt it was easier to explain a few things in English, although it is not my mother tongue. The songs in Portuguese to sound good has to be well written and talk about love can be risky, may sound corny and there are good Portuguese musicians. I like Tiago Bettencourt and Samuel Úria, both can and know how to write good lyrics. For example, in the last Samuel record there is a duet theme called "lean tissue" for me is a brutal sound and one of the most beautiful songs I know, it's a ballad between two men over a third who is crying or it is very well written, or can sound so bad.
It is curious that your music is associated with extreme sports groups, your compositions serve somehow as a backdrop to illustrate the achievements of these sportsmen. What do you think of all this? You write so deep songs and with a certain nostalgia.
FC: I also do sports, surf and skate and so are languages that are intrinsic in me and are part of my being and the music I make is an extension of who I am and can somehow be all interconnected, the metric and the rhythm can lead to this. It also helps, I have started playing in the middle of surfing circuit and when Gustavo Neves, who was the McNamara movie director, needed a soundtrack appealed to me, because I was in his imagination. He also proposed to me like that, because he knew I would accept and he is also a surfer.
The projection of the film catapulted you to the general public in any way?
FC: Yes, there was a large community who got to know me.
And for those who did not know you at all?
FC: Yes, there was indeed a lot of people did not know me and started to listen to my music because of the documentary. The McNamara film had a great design and is one more way to promote my music. Maybe the people who have seen these "crazy guys" climbing giant waves in Nazareth, which have always been seen by locals as cursed and which stop many fishermen to go out to fish in March, led tehm to take an interest, saw the film out of curiosity and heard through my music.
And they are surprised when they learn that you are Portuguese?
FC: Yes, they think is funy and that I used the Portuguese guitar, because it is the basic instrument of this soundtrack. I made sure it was, because it was the story of a Portuguese village and for me made perfect sense, despite entering a more electrifying music to finish the film, but the soundtrack is all packed in the waves and the Portuguese guitar. I think that link is curious and was even intentional because we are telling the story of Portugal.
And now, you touring with this last album, but are you preparing some new compositions, as you usually introduce them in your concerts?
FC: There is a theme I've written some time ago and has not been edited, I usually play it called "non friends" and I wrote it when I find out I was going to play with an American guitarist, named Kathy King. At the time did not know her, but immediately knew we had something in common, she is a brilliant guitarist and has a super-different approach to guitar and I also have my own view, it made some sense and composed this theme thinking about it, people who we do not know they are around the world and which could possibly be our friends. Hence the name and even played with her in three concerts, that had and has been a recurring theme on stage. When I'm home I'll have some ideas, I record it, some not, but are only there in the drawer. I am now more interested in mixing the new songs with older and not entered in playing the most recent compositions and how people already know some of my work I try to give them that. I try to show the last three discographic work, but also my concerts has some strong plot, alignment, improvisation, to make each concert unique and possibly if you see me on stage today the structure will be different when I play elsewhere and It is not equal to the album. It have appeared on stage ideas that we felt are good performed live and that we will explore later.
There is a recurring theme in concerts? That the audience always asks?
FC: I think not, never had large request. I had in a concert a person who was forward and shouted "don't leave tonight" which is a theme from a soap opera.
http://www.frankiechavez.com/about/
